Something weird happened last night between the Diamondbacks and the Cubs.
No, I’m not talking about David Bote pulverizing a home run that statisticians project would have gone 746 feet if Chase Field hadn’t installed a humidor (editor’s note: this is unfounded; no statisticians are claiming anything similar to this, or even commenting on the matter). I’m also not talking about Bote sending a laser into the left field seats a few innings later. Neither of those things were weird.
The weird thing was that the benches cleared, seemingly due to a simple misunderstanding.
Here’s a video, if you’re interested, but basically, after hitting those two dingers, Bote got hit in the back of the arm, just above the elbow, by a Matt Koch fastball. Bote then yelled at Koch, something like “control that, come on,” which led to a lot of things happening.
Koch put his hands up in a “what do you want from me” sort of gesture, implying no abnormal intent. Diamondbacks catcher John Ryan Murphy chased Bote down the first baseline. Bill Welke (the umpire) got out there fast to diffuse things. The benches started clearing, and Bote, seemingly realizing he had caused this by yelling at Koch, immediately started gesturing and yelling “my bad” back at Murphy, kind of like you would if you’d just come home late at night and let the door close too loudly, waking up a rambunctious dog which proceeded to wake up the whole house.
From there, everything played out conventionally. Jason Heyward and Daniel Descalso did a lot of yelling, Torey Lovullo had a long conversation with Welke clarifying that no one had been ejected, and Bote seemed miffed but might have just been in pain.
Anyway, the Cubs and Diamondbacks only play one more time this year, barring a playoff matchup (not outside the realm of possibility), and that time is this afternoon.
So, while it seems we’re on peaceful terms, there’s still the chance of a fight. Especially if any of the chirping last night was especially incendiary. We’ll keep an eye on it, but this isn’t especially promising.
